Well, at least Abe will be closer to Springfield

Phil Velasquez / Chicago Tribune

The 25-foot-tall Abraham Lincoln sculpture standing next to another large-scale figure that represents a common man holding the Gettysburg Address was removed from Pioneer Court Monday September 18, 2017. The sculpture known as "Return Visit" heads to Peoria, Ill.

The 25-foot-tall Abraham Lincoln sculpture standing next to another large-scale figure that represents a common man holding the Gettysburg Address was removed from Pioneer Court Monday September 18, 2017. The sculpture known as "Return Visit" heads to Peoria, Ill.

O glorious day! We arrived at Tribune Tower on Monday morning to a sight that made us rejoice: A giant crane had lassoed the Lincoln statue in Pioneer Court.

Moving day! No more 31-foot-tall, 19-ton tribute to America’s greatest president and some dweeb in khakis and sneakers who wandered in off the street. No more tourists strolling by, peering at the statue and muttering, “Huh? What’s this about?”

Lincoln and The Dweeb is now destined to dazzle and bewilder Peoria. Buh-bye!

No, this statue didn’t measure up to the last sensation on the plaza. That was a 26-foot-tall Marilyn Monroe posed in the famous subway-grate scene from “The Seven Year Itch”: smiling, eyes shut, skirt blowing up. Sure, some critics called it tacky, tawdry and sexist. And yes, a lot of tourists smirkingly gawked up her skirt and snapped the requisite photos to memorialize their moment of raunch on otherwise sedate Michigan Avenue.

But Marilyn drew giddy crowds and made people smile. We still miss her exuberance.

E. Jason Wambsgans / Chicago Tribune

The sculpture of Marilyn Monroe in Pioneer Court on Michigan Avenue in July 2011.

The sculpture of Marilyn Monroe in Pioneer Court on Michigan Avenue in July 2011.

(E. Jason Wambsgans / Chicago Tribune)

Before Marilyn was the quirkily appealing “God Bless America,” a giant depiction of farmer, wife, pitchfork and suitcase, modeled after Grant Wood’s famous “American Gothic” painting. That sculpture became a huge hit among shutterbug tourists and Chicagoans alike in 2009. Its gargantuan appeal rivaled the Bean (aka Cloud Gate) in Millennium Park and Calder’s Flamingo in front of the Kluczynski Federal Building.

Before Lincoln and The Dweeb defenders fire off angry emails to the Tribune Editorial Board, we concede that we’re not the keenest art critics. But we do wholeheartedly appreciate public art on Chicago’s streets — the beloved painted cows on Michigan Avenue in 1999, the life-size moose fashioned from recycled chrome car bumpers in Pioneer Court, Claes Oldenburg’s lacy Batcolumn on West Madison Street.

All of these provoke praise from some and scorn from others. Hideous or profound? You decide. That’s the beauty of art.

Take the Picasso sculpture in Daley Plaza, this year celebrating its 50th anniversary as a tourist love-it-or-hate-it magnet. What is it — butterfly wings? A cow sticking out its tongue? A flying nun? All of those and many other descriptions, some unprintably disparaging, have been offered by passers-by over the years.

When a proud Mayor Richard J. Daley unveiled the Picasso in August 1967, he recognized that it could take Chicagoans a while to embrace it: "We dedicate this celebrated work this morning with the belief that what is strange to us today will be familiar tomorrow," he said.

Fifty years later, it’s still strange. But the Picasso is also a worldwide symbol of Chicago — inspiring, perplexing, never boring.

So what’s next for Pioneer Court? A spokeswoman for Zeller Realty Group, which oversees the plaza, tells us there is “no public timetable for the next exhibit or event.” Why not? Several years ago, a spokeswoman explained: ”We like the element of surprise.”

So do we. Make it a good one next time.

Chicago celebrates 50 years of the Picasso sculpture at Daley Plaza on Aug. 8, 2017.